


Incalculable Times Again

by PurpleHydrangeas



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, BAMF Hermione Granger, Developing Relationship, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Harry Potter was Raised by Remus Lupin and Sirius Black, Involved Grangers, No Incest, Past Lives, Prophecy, Prophetic Dreams, Prophetic Visions, Psychic Abilities, Relationship Negotiation, Seer Hermione, Talking Animals, Triad - Freeform, V Relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-23
Updated: 2016-11-25
Packaged: 2018-09-01 15:57:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8630347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PurpleHydrangeas/pseuds/PurpleHydrangeas
Summary: When her mother earns a post at The Royal Devon, and her father is again urged to serve rural people who lack access to advanced dental care, Hermione moves to Ottery St. Catchpole. Though Hermione remembers lives aplenty, and dreams in detail of moments yet to come, she would never have guessed at what the move will bring into her life, nor does she ever anticipate Minerva McGonagall knocking on her front door.Her neighbors, however, have been a focal point of her dreams for years. That's not surprising, since she first met them in 86 C.E. Well, that she remembers, anyway.





	1. As a man, casting off worn out garments taketh new ones, so the dweller in the body, entereth into ones that are new.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a short and fluffy triad fic that is built off of discarded ideas for A Cord of Three Strands. It will be a few chapters long, much fluffier, and slightly more AU by virtue of the premise. 
> 
> Unlike my other stories, this is a WIP, mostly because I need a break from writing political intrigue, and just want to go full on AU for a bit, unfettered by cannon, though guided by it. That said, four chapters are written thus far. 
> 
> [Jack London's](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Star_Rover)book, The Jacket, contains the title. 
> 
> [Quoted Play.](http://sites.fas.harvard.edu/~chaucer/special/litsubs/drama/noah.html) It's a Wakefield Mystery Play. Noah, to be exact. It was first performed around 1377, I think. They were performed for a long time, and were the cultural context from which Shakespeare and his contemporaries sprang forth. My intention is to say that they were alive in the late 1300 and early 1400s, and then again in the 1560s or so, when I mentioned Mary, Queen of Scots.

Hermione was nearly eleven when her parents packed up the house and moved to their new practice in the rural village of Ottery St. Catchpole, deep within Devon. They had very good reasons, being that dental care in rural areas was a vastly underserved area, and they felt this call strongly. She also knew that they were doing this for her, in the hopes that a new environment would be more socially and emotionally enriching. 

In the hopes that her new neighbors would be sparse enough not to figure out that she was mad. 

She’d overheard them talking. Her mother had cried, begged her father to tell him what he thought would become of her. Her father hadn’t known. Hermione didn’t know why they worried so much. She would be alright in life. She had done this before, even if not exactly like this, and she knew life had a plan. She had known, somehow, from her earliest memories that she was meant to do something worthwhile, and all of this was mere preparation. 

Hermione was rather excited about the move. The girls at her primary were brutal, and Hermione was confident, somehow, that she would have friends in the village. She had always known, somehow beyond reason and intellect, that they were meant to move to Ottery St. Catchpole. Hermione had been anticipating the change for years. That’s why, largely, the things the students in her class said and did never bothered her for long. They didn’t matter, because their presence in her life was transient, if painful at the time. 

When they got to the village, and wove through the streets to the outskirts, Hermione saw the places and spaces of which she had only once dreamed come to life before her eyes. The moving lorry pulled up to a large house that looked like Miss Honey’s cottage in _Matilda_ , or at least how Hermione pictured it in her head. Hermione knew the reality to be better than any dream. There were all sorts of creatures with whom to visit in the garden. 

“This is our new house, Bunny.” Dad told her, as he parked the lorry in the drive of a brick house. He’d insisted on driving with the car hitched to the back, as he’d once done driving in the Service. “Why don’t you go inside and pick a bedroom?”

Hermione took the key and let herself inside as her parents parked the lorry and called the moving company. They were driving a second lorry, a much larger one. Hermione went through the entrance hall, and poked her head into the lounge and the kitchen. Each room seemed cosy and expectant, as though the house had been waiting for her. 

Hermione dismissed the notion as illogical as she headed up the stairs to take a look at the bedrooms. People talked, animals talked. Houses did not talk. They did not feel of expectation. Hermione knew that this was merely a dream coming to life. They did, rather a lot. It didn’t make life easier. In fact, having all of these snippets of information ahead of time rarely made sense as she couldn’t contextualize it until it happened. 

Upon inspection, she took the room at the back of the house, overlooking wide fields, with a great bill hill in the distance. Those fields had been in her dreams so many times that she always expected to wake up seeing them, and now she knew that she would. She set down her copy of _Emma_ on the windowsill, and claimed the room as her own. 

She was home. 

* * *

Within two days, they were unpacked enough to be settled in and eating off of plates rather than takeaway, Mum left for the Royal Devon and Hermione begged off of organizing closets with her Dad to go for a walk. He was starting work in a few days, and she was determined to get away from him, as he was on a roll to have the house in order. 

She’d already met and made friends with most of the creatures in the gardens, even the snake. His name was Chicken. He was quite funny, and Hermione had built him a nice rock habitat upon which to sun himself. 

She headed across the wide field, tramping along in bright pink wellies. It was a bright summer morning, quite suited to a walk. Hermione looked up at the blue Devon sky and spun slowly in a circle, animals calling out greetings all around her. Hermione chatted for a little while with a mouse named Click, and gave her directions to the house in case she should get cold when the weather turned. What her parents did not know would not hurt them, and Click promised to see her if she came to visit.  Hermione would provide rules then, having learned her lesson from an open door policy. 

She walked until that very big hill was upon her. She had first dreamed of that hill years ago, and she knew that going there was important. Hermione knew at once she wanted to climb it, and so she did, stopping every few feet to adjust and take in the view. At the top of the hill, a wide tree beckoned, and so Hermione settled there with her well worn copy of _The Little Princess._ It was a childish book, but Hermione loved it and it was a comforting read. She knew Sara was a giant Pollyanna, but she empathized with her loneliness. 

She met a spider and they had a lovely chat. Sara might have had a lovely doll, but Hermione could talk to animals, just in the way that Charlotte and Wilbur and Templeton talked to one another. She spoke to them in English, and their replies were made plain inside her head. 

No matter what her tormentors said, it wasn’t a joke and she wasn’t mad. 

Mum said that of course she wasn’t mad, even though she had seen five psychologists. Not only because of the animals, but also because she frequently knew things they said she could never possibly know, and because she had talked very frankly about lives she had once lived, but lived no longer.

In a recent life, she had been a suffragette. She had nearly always been female, and a citizen of what would become the United Kingdom. Beyond that, there was much variance in the lives her mind knew and her heart trusted, even as they came to her in bits and pieces. 

Dad said she had a creative mind and that one day, she’d write down her stories and make the world a better place. They both said those things with worry in their eyes. She wasn’t allowed a pet, not after she spent the whole visit to Granny’s conversing with Mr. Toodles, who really was starved for good company. That same day, she had corrected her grandmother who had incorrect information about Mary, Queen of Scots. She’d spoken with a French accent. French. Hermione knew. Granny had cried that a Scottish queen had a Scottish accent. Finally, Hermione had demanded, “Were you there? No? Well, I was, and she spoke English with a French accent!” 

Psychologist Number Three said that a pet would cause her to withdraw into her historical fantasies or into her conversations with them, so no pets were allowed in the Granger house, not even the goldfish she’d won once. She’d had to give it to another child, and had cried for three days. The fish hadn’t wanted to go, hadn’t wanted to be lonely without anyone to talk to, and neither had Hermione. 

She still resented her parents for trusting that stupid doctor and his suppositions over her truth. She knew the truth and she had told them it, and they hadn’t believed her. Even if they did not understand the things she could do or the things that happened around her, at least they ought to know that she was more trustworthy than some doctor who hadn’t even listened to anything she had said, or some other doctor who hadn’t realized she was lying to get out of there. 

She had been reading for about an hour when she heard screaming and people running up the hill. The hair on the back of her neck rose as realization dawned within her, hope bright within her heart. Hermione hid behind the tree trunk as she saw a band of boys with shockingly ginger hair race up the hill. There were two older ones, twins, and a younger boy who seemed to be about her age. After a long moment, Hermione saw an older boy holding a little girl’s hand as she trudged up the hill. 

“Ronnie!” One of the twins yelled, “I found a spider! Come see the spider!”

Hermione’s heart began to pound. She was literally living a dream, right down to the sun beating down on her rubber encased feet. She had dreamed of this moment, and had only realized it when she’d heard their voices. Hermione ducked behind the tree. She wasn’t supposed to interfere with a dream. It might not come true. 

She loved this dream. She felt she knew them. She wanted this dream. 

The second twin called, “It’s huge! The size of your head.” 

The younger boy screamed bloody murder just as the eldest reached the top of the hill. He sighed, let go of the little girl, and pulled a book, a very large one, out of his pocket, and demanded that the others stop teasing. It was called _Gump’s Transfiguration through the Ages: A Sophistic Perspective._

The little girl headed over to see the spider, who was now calling out to Hermione in concern, her accent thickening in terror as the first twin dropped to his knees. He might have been getting a good look, but he might have also been preparing to hurt Brunhild. 

Hermione grew concerned. She knew she had to end the dream. She could not let the spider be hurt Brunhild to be hurt, not even if never meant having another dream come true. She let it go, knowing that no dream was worth the pain of another being. And anyway, she did not want to be friends with children who hurt animals. 

She did not know these boys, and though her heart told her there was nothing to fear for the spider, she wasn’t going to trust her emotions. She stepped around the tree, and demanded, “You leave that spider be!” Her eyes clapped onto one twin and then the other as her hands found her hips, “She’s vital to the ecosystem.”

A shiver went up her spine.

Dreams merged with reality, and Hermione wondered once again if her dreams were more than mere expressions of her subconsciousness, even in this. Their eyes were deeply blue, deeper than even her dreams had conveyed, and suddenly, unbidden, she realized that she had missed people she had never met. Some part of her concluded that she wasn’t going to be lonely anymore. She’d learned the lessons that loneliness was meant to teach her, and it was time to move on to the next challenge. 

“Who are you?” The youngest boy demanded, sunlight behind him. “And what are you doing on our hill?”

“I don’t see your name on it.” Hermione sniffed, not liking his attitude. She put him right in his place, “And anyway, I was taking a walk. It’s perfectly legal.” 

She looked to the twins again, “Please don’t hurt the spider.” Somehow, she knew they’d understand, that they presently understood. “She’s not scary. Her name is Brunhild. She’s going to marry a spider named Llewellyn. She’s very excited. Don’t take her joy from her.”

Hermione supposed that Brunhild had been waiting a long time for her wedding. Such things didn’t concern Hermione, but she knew that all animals, and indeed every being, had different things that made them happy, and that was to be respected. Brunhild was going to build a new web in this tree, just for the festivities. Hermione was invited. 

“You can—” The twin who was rising to his feet shared a look with his brother before looking to her again. 

“Talk to her?” The second asked, his voice earnest and devoid of censure. 

In fact, when Hermione looked around, she saw that not one of the children were scoffing or laughing. Not one called her a freak. Not even one looked disgusted. Hermione knew in that moment that her heart had been right, and that she could trust them, and could allow herself to love them.

Maybe this dream was going to come true. 

Hermione blushed to the roots of her hair. “I’m not supposed to talk about that.” She didn’t even know their names and she was confiding in them. It wasn’t supposed to feel so fundamentally nice to tell someone, to share a secret with others, but it really did, “My Mum says its a secret.” 

“It is.” The oldest boy agreed, “And you are right to mind your Mum. Secrecy is very serious business.” He flipped through his book, completely full of diagrams and countless little words on the pages. He spoke with all the confidence of an elder brother. 

Hermione had a sudden flash of this boy, in her mind’s eye, as a scribe. The image suited him. 

The youngest of the children, a girl, seemed to understand how she was feeling and assured her. “We won’t tell.”

“After all, Charlie’s going to work with Dragons.” The boy seemingly closest in age, with dirt on his face, and wonder in his voice informed her of this fact, adding, “I think he must be able to talk to ‘em.”

 Hermione wondered if working with Komodo dragons meant moving to Indonesia. In this spirit of friendship and enthusiasm, she added, “I’m going to be Jane Goodall when I grow up. I’m going to work with elephants, though. I like elephants.”

“Jane who?” The girl asked. 

“A scientist who studies chimpanzees.” Hermione told her, “She’s just wonderful. Mummy took me to see her once when she gave a talk at the University.”

Once, when she had lived in India, she had an elephant friend. That had been a long, long, long time ago, and she knew better than to talk about those lives. Talking to animals was one thing, but living lives as other people was quite another.  

“Why?” The slightly taller twin asked, that same note of curiosity and wonder in his voice. 

“Their memories are like mine.” Hermione revealed, knowing that to have a good friend, you had to be a good friend. For her, that meant answering honest questions honestly, something no one back home in Crawley had ever truly valued, “I have memories I’ve never lived. I met Tilly at the zoo, and she said I wasn’t silly. She liked me.”

The boy with dirt on his face blurted. “That’s strange.”

Hermione did not look away. She might be strange, but Tilly wasn’t strange. 

“Shut up—” The first twin snapped in unison with his brother. 

“Ronald!”  The eldest boy called his name, and it was only then that Hermione realized that she didn’t know their names. They didn’t know hers. 

“That’s Ron, I’m Ginny.” She pointed to the twins, catching the look on Hermione’s face, likely. “That’s Fred, and George.” She gestured to the oldest boy, “That’s Percy. He’s thirteen. The twins are twelve. Ron’s ten, I’m eight. I’ll be nine soon.” 

“I’m Hermione.” Hermione reciprocated in kind. “I’ll be eleven in September.” 

And thus, friendships were born. Not because of her visions, her dreams, but because a few people had not scoffed and scorned her, had not mocked and run. They had reached out to her. She had friends. 

Her dream had really come true. She’d heard those names in her head so many times. And now, now, she was going to see what happened next. Better yet, she was going to make it happen. Dreams wouldn’t work unless she did. And anyway, she wasn’t at their mercy. 

She chose her life, and she wanted these people in it. 

* * *

 

They played together all summer, tramping about the fields. Sometimes, they played at her house, but she couldn’t go to theirs. Hermione stopped asking if she might when she realized it was a sore subject. She was just happy they came to see her and let her play with them. There were so many places to explore and so many animals to meet, that Hermione stopped hiding her talents. 

They even came in handy from time to time. Percy wasn’t as big a fuddy-duddy as they said. He liked to read, and she did, too. Though he was older, already away at school, they became close. It was nice to talk to someone who loved books. The twins were far more naturally intelligent, but Percy worked at it, and Hermione respected that fact. Hard work and diligence and commitment were nothing to scoff at, ever. 

Ron was funny at the strangest moments, and quietly kind. Hermione almost wished they could go to the same boarding school, the whole lot of them and her. He didn’t even go to primary school. Ron and Ginny were home taught. Ron said the worst things but meant them in the best ways, and always said what he was thinking. He treated her just like he treated Ginny, and he was the first person to make her feel like she belonged.

She couldn’t imagine not being around Ron. 

Ginny was a friend in the best of ways. Their relationship was slightly maternal. Hermione had this sense that she needed to take care of Ginny. It was likely bleed-over from a past life and she tried to ignore it. Ginny was her perfect foil, cheeky and sporty, bold and vivacious, and Hermione knew from the start that her soul was meant to learn from Ginny, just as Ginny was meant to learn from her. Whereas Ron never let Hermione be left out, or to even feel that way, Ginny pushed her to try new things and to see the world through Ginny’s eyes, which was a novel experience, mostly because Ginny was so unlike her.

It was impossible to think of Fred and George in the same way as any of the others. They weren’t friends like that, weren’t bonded in that familial sort of way. Hermione didn’t really question who they were in her life, or what roles they each played for each other. She supposed if someone pressed her, Hermione would have said they Fred and George simply understood her. They understood her and accepted her. With them, she didn’t have to explain. With them, she didn’t have to try. They didn’t have to try. She understood them, saw their intellect and brilliance. She saw the way George cared about everyone, and the way he hid it with jokes. She saw the way that Fred noticed everything and made connections and hid his perceptions with a finely tuned wit. 

There were no real questions with Fred and George, only the finding of answers they hadn’t known they were seeking until they found it together, rather like planning a prank. They weren’t alike, not physically, not mentally, not emotionally. They were funny. George was droll, always keen to have the last word. Fred was louder, and happy to have the first one. Hermione found that she was happy to balance them out, inject challenges into their life. Before she had come along, they had been very intellectually unchallenged. Hermione considered it great fun to take their suppositions about whatever prank or project they were crafting and turn it on its head, just to see what they might do in response. 

And so, it was the best summer she could remember. The Weasley children were a little strange. They had never seen the telly, they hadn’t ever had a lot of various foods, and they had never heard the radio. Mum supposed their parents were religious people of some sort, but she didn’t think so. Hermione resolved to figure it out. 

She tried to ask about their lives. Percy sniffed, look carefully around, and changed the subject. Ginny colored and asked if her Dad would play footie with them. Ron shrugged and asked for sugar pops. Fred and George didn’t have a single poker face between them. 

“You dad works for the government?” Hermione repeated, doubtful. “You didn’t even know who the PM was!” 

They hadn’t, last week, known that Thatcher was the PM. They’d asked countless questions about their governmental system. They’d known about the Queen, naturally, but you’d have to be severely ill to not remember someone who had been in the public eye forever. They hadn’t even known who their MP was, and while that wasn’t uncommon, Hermione was sure if their Dad was in politics as they’d said, they would know at least who the PM was, or at least know if their family liked her or not. 

Hermione leaned against the tree. George was drawing something on a pad of paper and Fred was encased in her tyre swing. “Do be serious, and if you can’t tell me, don’t lie.” 

“We’re not lying!” Fred insisted, “We don’t lie to you, not ever.” 

Hermione knew they didn’t, as surely as she knew the grass was soft and warm under her and the sun was bright. “You don’t, because you can’t.”

“We could. We choose not to, Hermione.” George reminded her, “Trust us, if there were lies we had to tell you to keep you in our lives, we’d lie with a smile and you’d never even suspect.”

“I would, too!” Hermione cried, “And don’t be dramatic.” 

Hermione had a sudden flash of a past life. There was a man in front of her, an actor performing not on the stage but on the street, in the midst of a city, perhaps London, even. He was reciting something, and looking at her as he said it. For some reason, she knew that he was talking to her. Hermione, in that place, felt a blush bloom on her face. Hermione heard it dimly in her mind, _“Dame, as it is skill, here must us abide grace; Therfor, wife, with good will, com into this place.”_

As soon as she saw it, the image was gone. She smiled. She had just told a boy who had once made his way as an actor, and a dramatic one at that, not to be dramatic. She smiled, the joke not lost on her. 

“What?” Fred asked, jamming his foot down in the grass to stop the spinning of the swing. He stared at her face. “What’s so funny?”

“Just that you think you can lie to me.” Hermione grinned and lifted her book, a chemistry text. “Enjoy the delusion, boys. I fear it shall not last.”

* * *

 

From behind the pages, Hermione noted that the twins exchanged a glance. Yes, they were hiding something. Then again, so was she. In time, the truth would be plain between them. She was certain that they were not yet ready. In time, in time. If there was one thing that Hermione knew, it was that time was endless, even when it felt like it was running out. 

Hermione was in trouble again. Her mother had taken away her _Betsy-Tacy_ books because she was meant to be organizing books, and not reading them. Only, no matter how high up her mother put the books, they floated down to Hermione and landed on her lap. And, well, after her reading lamp continued working after Dad had unplugged it last night because she really had to finish the chapter, she wasn’t in good standing with them. 

They didn’t believe her. She had not gotten the books, and she had not plugged the lamp back in after Dad had said not to, she really hadn’t. She logically understood why they didn’t understand. They loved her. Her parents had been her parents before, and she knew they loved her. They’d loved her when she’d left England to move to New England, and they’d loved her when they’d gotten news that she’d been burned at the stake. She would certain that they would accept that things just happened, one day. 

Until then, she was content to explore the countryside of Devon. Hermione ended up lost. She had spent the whole summer outside, finally making her parents happy with her merry band of friends, and she had never quite come this way. She was lost. She thought about turning back, but she knew she would never find her way. 

She was already in trouble, and she wasn’t about to compound it by not getting home on time. She was totally lost. They would murder her if she got so lost that they had to call the police in to find her. Hermione was not the best with spatial reason. She got lost easily, hated theme park rides, water slides, horse riding, and the like. She wasn’t keen on geometry, though she liked math, and forget spacial conceptualization. Usually, it didn’t impact her life. Now, however, now she was lost.

Hermione decided the thing to do was keep walking. Eventually, she would come to a hill where she could get up high enough to get they lay of the land, or she would find someone or something to guide her. Even the animals seemed to have departed, and the ones she had come upon had been disinclined to help her. Whoever said woodland creatures were fluffy and cute had never met the vast majority of them. 

Finally, she found herself walking along a dirt track with no one around and the sun getting higher and higher in the sky. Feeling somewhat uneasy, she called out, “Hello? Is there anyone who can help me?”

Hermione heard rustling in the middle of the stand of trees she was at the southern edge of, in the middle of nowhere. She did not even know how she had ended up on this track. Hermione called again, knowing there was an animal there, “I mean you no harm. I’m just lost.” 

A rabbit came bounding towards her. “Little girl, where is your Mummy?” 

The thing about rabbits, as a whole, was that they valued their young. Sure, they were often in a hurry, but what parent wasn’t frazzled to some degree? Hermione figured that Lewis Carroll had simply found a rabbit who had a large family at home. Hermione was so glad it was a rabbit and not a beetle. The beetles never liked her.

Hermione looked down at the brown-eared being near her, and admitted, “She’s at work. I’m just a bit lost, you see…” She continued, knowing she had found a listening ear, “I live just outside of Ottery St. Catchpole, in a brick house. Have you ever seen that house?”

The rabbit’s ear twitched, “Can’t say as I have.” She thumped her foot, “Tell you what, I’ve got a friend on a farm nearby. She’s a very smart mouse. She might know. I’ll show you there.” 

Hermione accepted with all due alacrity, and trudged along as the rabbit, “I’m Nell, dear.” went on about human parents letting their children out of the den before they could fend for themselves. Despite the fact that people thought rabbits bred proliferate families and abandoned them, that was not really the case. Hermione paid it no mind, and instead tried to get a bearing on her surroundings. 

Within a few minutes, Nell hopped, leading her around a wide bend in a track. The river Otter was nearby, and Hermione heard the rushing of the water and felt the swaying of the grasses along the bank along with the loud chatter of various animals she had long ago learned to tune out unless she was going to communicate with them. When she saw the footbridge, she knew she had to cross it. In her third eye, she saw herself, older and with equally horrible hair, rushing across it in the dark of night, her feet bare and her hair flying behind her. There was a strange stick in her hand, and a ring, too. 

Hermione was confused by both, though she could not see the ring in great detail. Clearly, she wasn’t meant to see that yet, and her mind wanted to explore what the Universe did not feel was her business. Evidently, one day she took up wearing jewelry. 

She’d believe that when she made it happen. Visions didn’t always come true, after all. She still hadn’t gotten a cat. She knew that she might, one day, but Mummy was adamant. Any strays Hermione found or nursed were sent to the RSPCA. Mummy and Dad fought about that. Dad thought that at least she had bonded to something in this world. Mummy was too scared to see it that way, Hermione knew. 

She looked at Nell, and smiled. Her house wasn’t far away. She had walked in a great big circle. “Nell, I know where I am now! This bridge goes back to my house!” 

The rabbit was a bit leery about leaving her alone, as her mate was at home with the children. Nell nearly insisted, but Hermione assured her she was well, thanked her for all she had done, and walked along. 

She put one foot in front of another, trusting herself as she crossed the footbridge and then walked along. She turned left at the fork, and soon saw a very tall house with a chicken coop and stone walls. It was at once a comfortable place in Hermione’s mind. Hermione just knew somehow that she had to bid her neighbors hello. After all, in the distance she saw a dot that she knew to be her home. They shared acres of back garden. How odd that she could not see the house from her window. 

Hermione noticed the sign that read, _The Burrow_ and knew that the name was perfectly suited to this cozy, homey place. She walked down the slight incline to the house, and went to the side door off the kitchen. Hoping up the stairs quietly, she waved to a spider in the eaves, and looked through the screen door. 

There, a woman was waving a stick she had sometimes seen in her dreams and visions, was using the stick to pour a steaming soup into bowls that were floating in the air. There were loaves of bread dancing in the air as they sliced themselves and flew in the air to be assembled into sandwiches. 

Hermione looked to the spider, and whispered, “It’s just like _Fantasia!”_

The spider replied, “It’s magic!” and climbed back into their web. 

The woman making lunch, for her part, gasped and spun around. The plates and the bread and the soup and the bowls and the sandwiches went falling to the floor as though they had never been animated. 

There were tears in her whitened face as she stared at Hermione, through the screen door. 

“Well, don’t cry!” Hermione urged, “You’ve magic. You can fix it, just like they fixed Cinderella’s dress!” 

It stood to reason that if she could pull food out of thin air that she could fix a mess. Hermione did not know why her hands were shaking. And yet, Hermione asked, “May I come in?” 

The woman nodded, “I think it best.” 

And so, Hermione entered the cosy kitchen. She bent to pick up the food, feeling very badly about the broken bowls and plates and stained tablecloth. She wished with all her might that the food was back where it belonged, and suddenly, the food was flying all around her. In a flash, the table was set. Everything looked lovely, right down to the flowers in the vase that hadn’t been there before. 

She was not surprised to see shock on the woman’s face. “I didn’t do that. I didn’t—”

Hermione only sought to ease her mind. She knew the past few minutes had been so wild that they would never speak of it to another living soul. “Funny things happen around me, please don’t worry. I’m sorry to bother you…” Hermione remembered her manners, “I’m Hermione.” 

“Mum!” Fred’s voice called from down a corridor at the side of the kitchen that ran the length of the house, “We heard a crash!”

Both twins emerged from the doorway. George was grinning, “And naturally we had to come and see who had out pranked us!” 

Hermione had never felt so much relief in her entire life. She should have guessed that this woman was her friend’s mother. She looked just like Ginny, right down to the wide smile. She wasn’t smiling now, but Hermione could see the lines on her face and knew that she nearly always smiled. 

“And look!” Fred began, his good humor faltering even as his smile did not, “It’s Hermione, the polyglot prankster!” 

“What’d you do, ’Mione?” George grinned, looking around the room. “Oi! You set the table.”

“Raising expectations!” Fred grinned, “So much for your bet on Percy—”

“Boys…” Their Mum, Mrs. Weasley began, “Is this your friend Hermione? The muggle girl from Ottery St. Catchpole?”  

“What’s a muggle?” Hermione asked, looking to the twins, who were grinning at one another and shooting worried looks towards their mother when their eyes weren’t clapped onto hers, “And you can see my bedroom window from your garden! Why couldn’t I see your house? And where did you get your wand? It’s a wand, isn’t it? And did you know that the spider on the stairs there knows you’re magical? Is it a secret?”

She knew that the twins knew she would never tell, but it seemed the sort of thing to promise Mrs. Weasley,  “I won’t tell, but it makes so much sense, because Percy has books about transfiguration and he won’t let me see them, even if I can see the words. He says Fred and George tell me what they say, but they don’t! We only just talk about it!” 

She looked back towards George and Fred, “A rabbit brought me here, her name was Nell, and…” Hermione trailed off, and looked away from the twins, “Sorry. Beg pardon. Go on, Mrs. Weasley.” 

“A muggle is a non-magical person, Hermione.” Mrs. Weasley revealed. 

“Oh.” Hermione replied, suddenly very sad that she wasn’t magical. She had somehow thought, in this moment, that everything made sense. “I’m one of those, aren’t I?”

“No—”

“I’ll have to check with Minerva, but I don’t quite think so.” She smiled gently, “You’re a witch, Hermione.”

“Well.” Hermione paused, as some memories rose to the surface at the back of her mind, “That explains why I was burned at the stake. Twice.” 

Fred and George looked as horrified as their mother. Hermione had forgotten that she had never told Fred and George about her past lives. She hadn’t remembered that the things she remembered without pain or judgement had the power to hurt those who cared about her. Hurriedly, she assured them. “Well, I’m hardly going to let it happen three times. Fool me once, you know.” 

They didn’t laugh. Evidently, it was too soon to be mentioning past lives. Which was a shame, really, they’d been in a lot of them. 

Mrs. Weasley shook her head, “And you can remember your past lives?”

“Yes.” Hermione revealed, before she blurted, “But you can’t tell my Mum or Dad I told you about them. They never believe me when I say things happen or that I really did do those things! Please, you can’t…”

She would keep their secrets, if only they would keep hers. She looked at the twins, knowing that somewhere in there were the souls of two being who had walked the earth with her countless times, through war and famine, plenty and excess. “Please. Please. We’ll have to go, we’ll have to move, and I’ve only just found you, I don’t want to leave you yet. It’s not time.”

“Hermione…” George’s soft expression calmed her, “We’ll help your parents to understand.”

“You’re not alone, not anymore, and I’d like to see them pack you off now.” Fred agreed, something in his face easing when she exhaled a ragged breath. 

“Are you sure?” Hermione asked them both, “Do you promise?”

“Told you once we’d never lie.” George reminded her. 

Hermione smiled. “Actually, Fred said that, not you.”

“Same thing.” Fred shrugged, even though they all three knew they weren’t the same person, the same being, the same souls. 

“Actually, no.” Hermione tried to be sober, but she couldn’t help but grin at their expressions.

They’d had this discussion before, and it always devolved into them soothing her ruffled feathers as she realized they’d been teasing her to rile her up. They were trying to make her feel better, and strangely, it was working. The panic she’d felt when she realized that her parents had only really moved not to give her a new start, but to make that start in a rural place without people to notice their mad daughter, was starting to subside. 

She had trusted them countless times. She did so now, not out of instinct, but by choice. They had earned her trust in the here and now, in these moments, in this life, the only life that really mattered. She knew that her trust was not misplaced. Whatever data informed that was her business. 

Fred grinned in return, “Want to come see Errol?” 

“He’s a bit grumpy,” George offered, “But I’d bet he’d love a chat.”

“Who’s Errol?” Hermione asked. “A pet?”

“Our owl. He carries mail, like the muggle post.” Fred stepped aside to gesture towards the doorway, “Like you say, who wouldn’t be grumpy with no one to talk to. Let’s go, Hermione! After we show you Errol, we’ll teach you gobstones. Every witch needs to play gobstones.”

George assured her, "I'm a gobstones champion. Don't take Fred's advice, ever. He cheats." 

"You do, too." Hermione volleyed back, on a hunch. 

He grinned back unrepentantly. 

Hermione looked quickly at Mrs. Weasley, who gave permission. Hermione moved down the hallway, asking all the while, “Now, what do magical owls do? And is there anything I should know? How do I best introduce myself?” 

The twins laughed, but Hermione knew they were only pleased. Keeping this secret, she knew, had weighed heavily on them. She knew how they felt when they told her that their parents had said they couldn’t tell their friends something.

After all, who would believe them? 


	2. Light precedes every transition. Whether at the end of a tunnel, through a crack in the door or the flash of an idea, it is always there, heralding a new beginning.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Light precedes every transition. Whether at the end of a tunnel, through a crack in the door or the flash of an idea, it is always there, heralding a new beginning.”  
> ― Teresa Tsalaky, The Transition Witness
> 
> TW: For the Grangers being very worried about Hermione's mental health. References to in-paitent treatment, ECT, stigma, magical people not understanding the mental health system, and Hermione's own concern that she might actually need mental health care.

Hermione wasn’t quite sure what to make of this situation, nor of all of the feelings rushing through her. She tried to focus on the game, but she knew their hearts weren’t in it. After they got started on gobstones, Hermione looked to Fred, who was across the circle whereas George was next to her. “How can you be sure I’m magical?” 

The boys shared a glance. George pulled his wand from his pocket and took her hand. He turned her hand over, and pressed his wand into her grasp. Hermione’s fingers tingled as she grasped the smooth implement. Her whole body felt as though it was incandescent, her very atoms coming to life in new ways. 

 She looked to Fred as George placed his hand gently on her elbow, “What do I do?”

Fred muttered, “Nox.” 

The whole room went dark, bathed in the shadow of the light coming in through the cracks in the shutters and below the drapes. The shades were pulled in difference to the summer’s heat. Hermione felt the heat swell. “Maybe…” George suggested, leaning closer, “You should try a waving the wand, and saying, ‘Lumos.’”

“Is there some specific pattern…” Hermione ventured, terribly worried that this wouldn’t work. She wanted so desperately to get this right. If she didn’t, if she wasn’t magical, she wasn’t sure that she could bear it. She couldn’t bear to have the idea that she might fit in someplace taken from her.

“Just try, Hermione.” Fred urged, “If you don’t do it, we’ll never tell, and you’ll be the first muggle at Hogwarts.”

How they planned to make that happen eluded Hermione. They’d told her there were wards on the school like those on the Burrow. Still, something in Fred’s voice said they would stop at nothing to make good on that promise. It was a bit of an odd feeling, to know that she had a friend who saw their lives as entwined, even if they didn’t have the knowledge she did. That, she supposed, was trust, pure and simple. 

Hermione wished they could remember her soul, her presence in the lives they’d had before. She could not spend her life wishing for things that wouldn’t eventually matter. She would stand or fall on her own merits, not on the persons she had once been, for they were dead and gone. She had make her life matter now, and to dwell in the past would impede that task. 

She wasn’t going to say she’d lacked the courage to try, or to let down those who believed in her despite the proof and evidence she’d sought for so long on behalf of her parents. And so, Hermione closed her eyes, moved the wand in the way that felt almost instinctual, as though she had long missed having a wand in her hand. “Lumos.” 

The tip of the wand lit, illuminated the darkness, and highlighted the grins on her companion’s faces. She could see, and her hand was tingling and her arm felt light. She had…she had…she was…

The wand clattered to her lap. Her palms were slicked over with sweat. “I did it.” Before she could stop herself, she whispered, “I’ve missed that part of me.”

It felt, to Hermione, as though she was rediscovering some part of her soul that had always been there, waiting for this moment, for this moment that she shared with these souls. She had not dreamed of this moment, but she knew. She knew. She understood, now, why she had gone to her death so fearlessly when she was burned at the stake. She understood a new part of herself. She was not afraid to die for her truth. This was her truth. 

She saw no shame in being burned alive for it. Better to die by the truth than live for a lie. 

In the returned semi-darkness, she launched herself at these two souls. Maybe she didn’t know them well now, but she had known them once, and she knew she would know them again, because she intended to be their friend, come what may. 

She was not alone anymore. There were no other people on the planet with whom she would want to share this rediscovery of a part of herself, long dormant but flaring with hope and light inside of her, as the wand in her grasp had flared with light. 

Hermione was not surprised to find that their arms opened instinctively to her as stones scattered across the floor. Hermione struggled with feeling as though she had come home, as though it had been almost a century since someone she knew had hugged her thus, since they had hugged her. She felt badly for needing them so badly, for trying so hard to commit this moment to memory. 

“I know you don’t remember me. But I remember you two, and I know we’re not the people we once were, and I know hugging you both is weird, but thank you for always being there with me.” Hermione breathed inwardly, and she smelled ink and wood smoke, peppermint and sea air. “You’ve helped me find my magic.”

Hermione closed her eyes, and was overwhelmed with the thud of cannon fire, the burning of mustard gas. Fred had died on the front, fighting for king and country. As often happened, she knew this information with a deep knowing within her soul, as sure as she knew that winter was dreary and cold, even though it was summer outside their doors. 

 At that time, the man George was had been entirely focused on freeing his homeland from what he’d felt then to be imperialist oppression, and had gotten into a horrible fight with his brother just before he’d shipped out to the front, though he had come to say goodbye at the last second.

They’d disagreed on the meaning of war, as though it had any other meaning that destruction and death in store for them. Most of their country had supported the War, but not George. He’d participated in some big political event, but that seemed unimportant because her mind did not supply the name. 

Later, George had come south to find her at her father’s home, and found that she had died in the fight for the vote. He’d died, soon after, pneumonia that was rooted in his exposure to a different sort of warfare.

She remembered clinging to them desperately as the train whistle blew, pressing her cheek to Fred’s uniform and George’s plain clothes, as the station bustled with men headed to war and children crying out for their fathers. 

With a sudden knowing, Hermione saw their faces as they had been then in her mind’s eye. Their eyes had been blue, then, too. She had promised them and herself that one day she would see those eyes again. Despite the fact that it had taken decades and death and birth, Hermione realized that she had kept her promise. 

Not even magic could save them from the fates they had chosen. And yet, the memory of a thousand hugs just like this one came flooding back. In a thousand ways, and a thousand yet more, they had been different people. Despite the limitless variances, their hugs felt just the same. 

For whatever they had once been, nothing would replace or overshadow this moment. They were friends who believed in her as she believed in them. She knew one day that they would take all their pranking and change the world. It wasn’t a psychic knowing. She just believed in them. Maybe in the past they had been something else, but now, they were the only people who believed in her when she did not even have the courage to believe herself. 

Fred hugged her back, and Hermione fought the urge to cry. She had missed them so much. So much. And they didn’t know her. Hermione felt, for the first time, that these memories were a burden. Before this moment, they had been something that made her feel special. But now, now they were something they really did make her feel her isolated. 

How horrible to know them, almost better than she knew herself, and to be alone in those memories, those knowings. It was a physical pain that bloomed in her solar plexus. It hurt so deeply that she felt her soul to be bleeding. George nudged her gently, more gobstones scattering as he rested his head on her shoulder. She felt his pulse against her shoulder, and knew that those lives did not compared to this one. Those memories were impressions, but this, this was sensation. 

After a long moment, George asked, “Tell me, Hermione, do you bite your nails?”

Hermione pressed her face against him, a hot blush rising over her. No matter what she had done or her parents had done, she had never been able to break the habit. Her nails were bitten to the quick and ragged on a regular basis, and they seemed to grow in very quickly, only to find their way to her mouth again. “It’s a nervous habit.”

“One you’ve had for thousands of years, in one way or another.” Fred agreed. 

Hermione looked up, and the lights went back on by the sheer force of her will. She needed to see their faces. “You remember me?”

“Not with the same clarity you always have…” Fred allowed, his own grip as sure and as true as his words. 

“But the second we saw you…” George’s hand shook as he gently touched her messy hair. “That part of our minds were always there, and we wondered how we’d ever, for one second, not known you. Or thought you a stranger.” 

Relief coursed through her as she rested between them. It was breathtaking in its intensity and meaning. This was a gift. She didn’t know where it came from, or care who had given it to her, but she thanked them all the same. She was not afraid to admit that she felt humbled. 

“Know you better than we know ourselves, somehow.” Fred agreed, “We always wondered what was missing in our lives, because really, logically, life was great. I never thought it was a who.”

Hermione understood. She cried, burrowing into them, and held them as they cried. The hug was familial, the closeness of three souls who had always, in some fashion, known each other. It wasn’t sexual. She wasn’t even aware of them as boys. They were simply Fred and George, and she was simply Hermione. 

She wasn’t alone anymore. She didn’t have to carry this history within her bones, and wonder if she was the only one who remembered and who cared, and who saw bits of her past everywhere she went. “Thank God.” 

The tears that spilled down her face were ones of relief and joy. “It’s been so hard. I hate going places, because I see parts of my pasts, and they’re not there anymore, and when I tried to tell anyone, they thought—” 

Hermione broke off, letting herself be soothed as she knew now her own presence must be doing for them. Neither Fred nor George knew of the years of psychological evaluations. She was not going to tell them that she was finally certain that she wasn’t actually in need of treatment, like some voice in the back of her mind had always rationally suggested. Some part of her had wondered. Still, she had to test it. “Do either of you remember that horse I had? The one with the bushy tail everyone called the devil?”

“Crackerjack,” George smugly replied, “was a total arse.”

“That would be the memory you pick to test us.” Fred rubbed his own arm. Centuries ago, her beloved horse had bitten him in the arm for one reason or another, taken a chunk of flesh from the warrior he had once been. “If I ever see that horse again, he and I are having words.”

Hermione sighed. She knew her chances of seeing that horse again were slim, but she was contented to have found Fred and George. How odd it was, to not have seen two people for at least fifty years, and to feel as though no time had passed at all. 

That, she supposed, was what having best friends was truly like. For a long time, nothing more was said between them. There was nothing to say. The echoes of the past faded in the face of a wondrous and unwritten future. 

And, best of all, they were together. They were together. They could face anything. After all, they had weathered war, famine, plenty, poverty across the centuries that humans had populated this earth. They could weather being three magical, mixed-up kids. Of this, Hermione was fundamentally sure. 

* * *

Mr. Weasley was home when they came downstairs. Hermione tucked her hair up on a knot on the top of her head and borrowed an elastic from Ginny to keep it there, her bout of tears and a really nice hug having overheated her. Ginny stopped on the stairs, “You’ve been crying. Are you alright?”

“It’s not every day you find out you’re a witch, Gin.” Hermione told her, and while that was true, Hermione felt the validation that she was sane and no longer so alone in life to be the larger revelation. 

“Oh.” Ginny smiled, “I knew you’d figure it out. Sorry I wasn’t allowed to tell you. I bit my cheek bloody a few times.” 

Hermione laughed, knowing that this was likely true. Ginny was not one to hold back the truth. She padded down the stairs, and noted that it was getting late. She was fairly free range now that she was making friends, but she knew her parents were sure to be home soon, and they did worry to the point of distraction and obsession. 

After some chatting and interaction, Hermione ended the visit, thanking them for the hospitality and adding, “I should head home, Mr. Weasley, but it was nice to meet you.”

He seemed so interested in a muggle home that Hermione accepted his company on her walk home. He seemed disinclined to let her go alone, and Mrs. Weasley wanted a chat with Fred and George. With a wave to Ron, who had wanted to come until Mr. Weasley told him to peel potatoes for dinner, they set off. 

The walk across the wide fields was an comparatively easy one. “Do you suppose I’ll have to tell my parents?” Hermione asked, revealing, “There is a very good chance they will not react favorably.”

Mr. Weasley nodded in the fading light, the sound of their footfalls filing the silence until he spoke. “Many parents have a bit of a time, but I know your parents love you. You mustn’t be afraid.”

Hermione knew that she had to help him understand. “You see, Mr. Weasley…” Hermione took a steadying breath, “What can you tell me about magical mental health care?”

Mr. Weasley briefly explained. In many cases, it was nearly identical to the muggle system, save the fact that they used spells and potions and not pills and biofeedback. The talk therapy was much the same, even if evaluative processes were more sophisticated. This made what she had to tell him easier, as there was enough of a common starting point. 

Hermione watched her feet in her wellies carefully as she spoke. “My parents, understandably, have seen my magic and my…”

“Your unique talents?” He suggested, clearly having spoken to his wife.

 Evidently, such a soul deep connection with other people was not very common. According to Fred and George, there had been a few instances in history, but largely, those bonds were that of  their former incarnations.  They were unable to say more, as their parents had been closemouthed about the whole thing. Hermione empathized. 

Hermione accepted the blanket term, not ready to define anything or become sidetracked by the million questions in her mind. “Yes. Anyway, they’ve long thought I have mental health and medical challenges. There was some discussion of long-term treatment and hospitalization, as well as medications. I promised if we could move, it would all end.”

Hermione had known the stakes, and she knew that moving here was the last roll of the dice before she would be forced to comply with some old fool’s idea of a treatment plan as they had never expected her to keep such a promise. They didn’t blame her for her uniqueness, they only feared for her. “They believe me to be delusional and likely ill indeed.” 

“Merlin.” Mr. Weasley breathed. He stopped and placed a hand gently on her shoulder, the lantern he carried in the fading light shining brightly between them, “You must never doubt yourself. What you know to be true is real. You are not anything of the sort. You are, without question, the most powerful witch of the age. You will need to trust yourself if you are to do what you must.”

Hermione did not believe that she was especially powerful. Right now, she felt like herself. She was a scared girl, going home to tell her parents something she knew was going to send them up into the boughs. They would be embarrassed, thinking that she had gotten her her friends and their parents to play along with whatever fantasy she had cooked up now. 

She bit her lip. “I’m so scared they’ll make me leave. I don’t want to go away.” The thought of knowing, of being validated, and then being silenced just as soon as she stood on the precipice of fulfilling her long-sought potential was horrifying. 

Mr. Weasley swallowed. “We’re not going to tell them tonight. You need some time to adjust, and I have a few people I know who’ll be good at helping you.”

“When I do tell them, will you and Mrs. Weasley and George and Fred be there, too?” Hermione thought of the conviction in their eyes when they’d both told her that nothing would separate them. Hermione believed them.

Had she not known that they were warriors, leaders, kings, poets, and peacemakers, Hermione would have trusted them just for who they were now. Being that she did know, she thought that having them there was going to be needed, because they could offer up corroborating details. 

“Of course, Hermione.” Mr. Weasley agreed, “We look after each other.”

Hermione supposed he meant wizarding peoples, even though her heart wondered if, perhaps, he was acknowledging her as family. There were only so many trips she could take around the wheel with Fred and George before she knew on some deep level that she loved the people they loved, without question. 

* * *

Hermione slept fitfully, her dreams nothing but nebulous thoughts that never quite coalesced. When she woke and knew there would be no returning to a fitful sleep, she pulled her quilt up and stared at the stitches in the blanket. The fabric was undoubtably known to her under her fingertips. 

She’d made it. Hermione was very good at quilting. Everyone said she was naturally and prodigiously talented at fiber arts. She could knit, sew, crochet, tat, do anything with fabric and needles, textiles and threads. She found it meditative and soothing. 

Hermione made a lot of her soft goods. She could sew her own clothing, though she rarely bothered unless it was a special occasion. After her third or fourth attempt, she did not need a pattern. She could draw one up herself and make a picture in a film or a idea in her head come alive. She preferred to make towels and the like, as well as her sheets. She looked at the neat stitches on her quilt, and then rolled over and noted the openwork and the edging on her pillowcases. 

Yesterday hadn’t been a dream. Hermione heard a careful tapping at her window, and sat bolt upright, wondering if it was another wounded bird come to see her after word had gotten round in the ecosystem that the girl who lived here could help any creature that came her way. 

Errol was there flapping at the window, clutching an envelope in his beak. Hermione slid open the window, and greeted Errol, “Good morning, Errol.” She took the offered envelope, “Can I offer you some breakfast?”

“Indeed no.” He hopped over to the desk from the window, balancing poorly on the back of her chair, all angles and slapstick, which Hermione thought contrasted so charmingly with his proper and prim voice and sense of self. “I’ve eaten. I’d be happy to wait for a response.” 

Hermione opened the envelope carefully. There was thick piece of vellum inside it. Unsurprisingly, it read in a beautiful handwriting she recognized as Fred’s own. _H, Expect us for elevenses. Do not worry. We’ve got a way to fix it right up. -Gred._

Another handwriting took over. _P.S. Look out your window. -Forge_

Errol noted, having read the missive himself, his keen eyesight enabling him to do so. “It’s really not far. There you see Ginny’s window, and indeed, above it, that of the twins.” 

Hermione grinned, and grabbed a pen from her desk. She wrote on the back of the parchment. _Nice sign. -H_  

For in the window of their room, Hermione could see a pasteboard sign that flashed and read. “If you can read this, you’re magical. Also, your name is likely Hermione. In either case, Hello.” 

Hermione laughed as Errol flew off, and went to the shower. When she went downstairs to see her parents working on case notes and whatever else they did, Hermione ventured, “What are we going to do? Stock the china cupboard?”

The organization of the china cupboard was an oft delayed chore. No one wanted to go through doing it. And so, when Hermione wanted to know what they were doing, she took to asking about that chore. The boxes that held all of their good plates were still stacked in a closet. By the time she was in Uni, she figured her parents would have unpacked them. 

Her father was all good humor as he bustled out of the room to find a teapot, “We’re having company in about an hour.” 

Inwardly, Hermione was relieved. It must be Fred and George. Her parents set about putting on tea and making sure there was something to feed them, because nobody who came to visit left unfed. Her Granny would faint. It was a bit soon to put the kettle on, but they seemed overjoyed and keen to make sure this was really happening that they bustled and fussed.

By saying nothing, her mother elaborated far more freely than she otherwise might’ve done, “The Weasleys have finally responded to our invitations. I’m so glad they’re coming. I’m so happy to see you making friends and living in the real world.”

Hermione inhaled sharply. She had always lived in the real world. There was more to the world than what her mother saw or believed. Just because Mum couldn’t see beyond the end of her nose… 

Hermione continued scrambling her own eggs, whipping the whisk with just a bit too much control and pouring them with a sharp hiss into the heated cast iron pan. She did not look up to meet her mother’s gaze as they bubbled from contact with the heated butter and metal.

“I’m sorry.” Mum hastened, counting out cups. “That was low. You’re trying so hard, and making so much progress. I shouldn’t make comments like that. You deserve better, and I’m sorry.” 

Hermione swallowed, making eye contact with her contrite mother. “Please don’t say things like that around them. Please. They’re my friends…” 

Hermione let her mother assume that she didn’t want them to know that she had what her parents called ‘issues.’ Rather, the truth was that she did not want to put her parents in a spot. 

Furthermore, she did not want to put her parents in a place of enmity with George and Fred. They weren’t too keen on her parents, which Hermione understood. They’d picked up on the tension, as had Ginny and Ron, over the course of the summer. They were perceptive, too perceptive. Hermione prayed that Mr. Weasley had kept his mouth shut. She would hate to have to deal with more problems and communication issues. 

Her mother promised. Mum always kept her promises, or at least she tried, and that was all Hermione could ask. Her heart broke for her mother, beneath her resentment. The path her mother had chosen was not easy, and she tried to be a good daughter. She would never be enough, but she knew they loved one another in the end. 

In the end, love was all there really was.

* * *

Hermione helped to get ready after quickly eating her eggs and some toast.

She fretted internally that maybe telling her parents wasn’t the best idea. Maybe she could control it, now, and there would be no real reason to inform her parents at this moment. Hermione bit her nail to the quick, but luckily, it healed instantly. No, she thought, not luckily. Magically. 

 After a time, she went and got her drop spindle. Her mother, upon her return to the kitchen with said tool, developed that ever-present line between her eyes. It wasn’t uncommon for people to have crafting related hobbies, but anything remotely historic made her mother break out in hives. Hermione considered going and fetching her embroidery hoop, but given that her mother couldn’t hold a needle, Hermione’s innate talent also made her uneasy. 

Hermione had a lot of hobbies that made her mother uneasy, ranging from medicinal homeopathy to cooking and baking, to historical debate. She was not allowed to join historical associations anymore, because her parents felt it drew attention and encouraged her when the psychologists advised she should be put into dance classes and forced to join the swim team.

They theorized that peer interaction and physical exertion would help. She’d started country dancing in some form in the dance class. Hermione didn’t remember what dance she had done, but she did remember that her mother had cried. 

Grabbing a bundle of fleece, Hermione attached it to the hook at the top of her spindle. She spun the spindle as she pinched and pulled, holding the fleece with over the back of her hand, and drew out the fleece with one hand in chunks, giving the spindle a tap when it needed more momentum. It typically spun very well on its own. 

She held the fleece firmly between her thumb and index finger as she spun. She loved to spin. It was easy to twist the fibers round the spindle and keep going. Sometimes, she got lost in her thoughts, but all told it was nice to just be able to know what she was doing and do it with the fullness of her abilities without judgement. 

She worked until she heard the doorbell ring. Hermione did as was expected and walked out to the entry in order to greet their company, setting her spindle down on the counter. 

She heard, upon her approach, not only Fred and George and their parents, but also a comfortingly strident accent. The woman, whip thin with a kind smile and bright eyes, greeted Hermione warmly, and was introduced as Professor McGonagall. “I’m happy to be meeting you all outside of school.” 

Hermione replied with a smile. 

“Oh, do you teach at Maynard?” Mum asked, leading the small crowd into the kitchen and watching with hope in her eyes as everyone got settled, “Hermione is so excited to begin. Aren’t you, love?”

Hermione dissembled, knowing that there was very little hope of being happy anywhere, even if the school did seem very nice and everyone she had met there had been so very kind. Mum was keen on single-sex education, and indeed Hermione was too, if only the other girls had been witches. 

Her response clearly amused the professor, who smirked and smoothed it away before addressing her mum, “No, Dr. Granger. I teach at a highly selective school in the Highlands. It serves profoundly gifted children. I am also very close to Arthur and Molly, and when they told me of your daughter’s prodigious talents, I felt it wise to meet you. I hope you will forgive my intrusion.” 

Her parents insisted it was no intrusion and agreed that yes, Hermione was profoundly academically gifted. Such had been the subject of much discussion. Hermione didn’t much care about her IQ. It wasn’t the number that mattered, not when she had found ways of adapting and learning, and too many other gifted children her parents had encouraged her to get on with had been absurd about the whole thing. Her IQ didn’t define her. What she did with it was the only thing that mattered. 

“We’re students there, you know.” Fred interjecting, accepting the cup of tea he was offered. 

“Best in our year.” George slanted a glance at Professor McGonagall, “Which one of us is ranked first?” 

“Cooperation and communication will serve you well, gentleman.” Their professor replied, eliciting a laugh out of the adults. 

They engaged in conversation that effectively ignored the younger people at the table. This suited Hermione fine. She was happy to talk to George and to Fred without her mother’s eagle eye and her father’s interest and concern weighing heavily upon them. George dropped his voice to meet her ear from where he sat next to her, “She never tells. Fred’s all talk.” She heard the grin in his voice when he added, “It’s always the quiet ones.” 

Hermione bit her lip. She grinned, and considered her own cup of tea. Fred passed her the sugar. He didn’t bother to give her the milk. She didn’t take it. That, he passed directly to George, who poured a prodigious amount into his cup. 

Knowing from conversations over the course of the summer that Hermione found milk in tea to be the anathema of good taste, Fred nudged her gently, “He needs the brain food, don’t mind him. He’s younger this time round. I’ve got to enjoy it while I can.”

Hermione snorted. Fred was routinely the older of the two. Of course they weren’t always brothers, but Fred was always the more jocular and outgoing one, even in lives where he hadn’t seemed that way. 

Mum caught that, of course she did, because she was always worried that Hermione would say something wrong. Hermione missed the freedom of spending the summer out of doors. She was smiling, but there was no humor in her eyes, only worry. “Do you mean to say he might one day be older?”

Fred shrugged, “It’s possible.”

“Aren’t you a bit young to be thinking about your death?” Mum smiled, extending a plate of biscuits his way across the table,“You’ve got decades.”

Mum was touchy about death. Hermione did understand it. After all, how could she not be, when her toddler had routinely talked about her own previous deaths with a smile on her face? It must have seemed to her mother a very horrific thing, and so she had eventually banned all discussion of death from the Granger household.

 Hermione thought that unfair, as death was a part of life, and making it a scary thing really didn’t help people. Nevertheless, she understood her mother’s position and was glad to see the boys load up their plates with biscuits.

Fred went to speak, but Hermione made a sound that cut him off, and took the conversation over. “Professor, I want to thank you for coming.”

“I admit to some curiosity.” She admitted, smiling gently at Hermione, “Which I am sure you can understand. Tell me, in how many languages do you hold fluency?” 

Hermione, knowing that her talent for languages was a hold over from past lives, was inclined to lowball the number. There was no reason to lay all of her cards on the table. She had learned that the hard way when asked this question by well-meaning professionals in the past. 

“I can read, write, and speak, English, French, German, and Latin. I’m also possibly fluent in a few Celtic languages.” She admitted a sliver of the truth, which was the best way to hide another truth. You admitted one truth to hide another, “I’m never sure until I encounter a language and native speakers are harder and harder to come by.”

“If I may?” Professor McGonagall asked, and with Hermione’s nod, she asked a very simple question in what Hermione realized with a thunderclap in her mind was Gàidhlig. She asked, “How are you?”

Hermione thought for a long second before it felt as though a vault was being opened in her mind, and the entire language came flooding back as though she had never missed a day speaking it, even though she could not remember the incarnations that went with it. She knew that if she worked at it, she might remember it, unless there was some reason the powers that be didn’t want that to happen. She frequently was only given snippets of information at given times, so as to not impede her living her life. Often, the information didn’t make sense until later, as with visions and knowings of her own future. 

 Essentially she replied, “I am well. I would happier if my parents knew I was a witch. I’d also be happier if you two,” Hermione glanced at the boy on either side of her, who knew perfectly well what she was saying, “would stop looking so smug and talking about things you know will get a rise. You’re annoying my Mum.”

They sobered, though the humor in their eyes didn’t dampen. They didn’t mind annoying her Mum. Of course they understood what she was saying. They did not, however, understand the implications of what she was saying would have for her parents. Underneath her heartbeat as realization set in, Hermione could practically feel her parents ticking away on their mental lists to figure out how many languages she now copped to speaking. 

Hermione looked to her parents, whose faces were bloodless. She blurted, “I’m sorry!” 

She wasn’t supposed to speak a language like that, without lessons, and so she trudged through Spanish at school, never letting on that she could zip through the levels and had to make stupid mistakes not to give herself away. 

Her parents never reacted well to her linguist abilities. In France, they’d been shocked. In Germany, annoyed. When she started spouting off in classical Latin at a happenstance meeting with a professor in such a way that helped him through a mired translation, they had made yet another appointment with a learning psychologist, who had sent her for another evaluation, which had led to a battery of medical tests. 

Hermione had learned to hide language proficiency away, claiming that she could read but not speak one, or the like, when caught. 

McGonagall looked shocked. “Why apologize for an innate talent, Miss Granger? You should no more apologize for being short or having green eyes! You are prodigiously brilliant and uniquely gifted.” 

Hermione glanced  at her father. He spoke, “Several neurologists have concluded that Hermione’s neural pathways are wired in such a way—”

Hermione had met neurologists aplenty, all of whom had marveled at her, declared her healthy, passed her off to oncologists to check for rare cancers, who passed her back to mental health workers who were largely befuddled. She had been riding that carousel for years. 

“She’s been widely examined.” Mum concluded, avoiding a discussion of the medical theories. Clearly, she was doing her best to keep the promise that she made to Hermione this morning.  

“When the twins started spouting off in three and four languages before they could crawl, and mixing them all up to create their own language, I worried as well.” Molly smiled, “I can only imagine what it must be to encounter their abilities with no cultural context to explain it.” 

Arthur agreed, “I had to teach myself how to say ‘No!’ and ‘Stop!’ and ‘Are you hungry?’ in no less than fifteen languages. They used to stop speaking English and pretend they neither spoke nor understand it. For weeks, all they said would be, ‘Meea navidna caw zasawzneck’ or some variant thereof.”

“We were trying to teach you!” Fred insisted, adopting a generally offended expression. 

“And do excuse us for preferring other languages.” George sniffed. “I swear, being a twin allows you no individuality. Can’t even pick a language without comment. Just for that I ought to speak nothing but Spanish.”

“I wish you wouldn’t.” Hermione muttered in a minority language used in Spain. She didn’t even remember what it was called in English, somehow, the language came flooding back, just enough to put paid to that idea. Hermione made a mental note to dig into that language. Sometimes, they came back as trickles rather than as a flood, and she did enjoy rediscovering things. 

“I’m afraid I don’t understand.” Mum looked to Hermione and then to the Weasley parents, “They are polyglots in the same fashion?” 

“If Hermione can speak it, chances are we can.” George assured her.

“And if we can speak it, chances are she can.” Fred elaborated. 

Hermione did not explain why. Not yet. She couldn’t find the words. 

Dr. Granger, Mr. Granger,” Professor McGonagall took charge of the meeting, “I have every reason to believe that Miss Granger will be the top of her form. I’m here to explain why she will be offered admission to—”

“Hermione cannot go to your boarding school.” Dad was quick to cut off the professor with a determined shake of his head, “She’ll be a day girl.”

Mum was very emphatic. “Her health simply does not allow her to be away from home in such a fashion.”

Mr. Weasley cut off his son’s exclamations of worry. Hermione instinctively took their hands. “She doesn’t need psychiatric care. She’s a witch. All those things she’s told you, all those things that happen that are unexplainable are truly real. She’s not in need of ECT or hospitalization. Just a wand, and some education.” 

And then calamity broke out. Hermione was utterly shocked by the swell of noise around her. Her parents cried out, “You cannot possibly be serious!” and other variances thereof, whereas Mrs. Weasley rushed to reassure them, and to soothe them. 

“What’s ECT?” Fred demanded.  

George spoke at the same time, “And why would you put her in a hospital?” 

Hermione began to answer both questions at once, “ECT is where they induce a small seizure in a controlled setting to help someone with severe depression and or other mental illnesses  in such a way that brain chemistry—”

It was really a good choice for a person who wanted to make it. Modern medical professionals used every precaution to make it comfortable, and there were safety controls. ECT was a valid treatment for people who needed it and chose it out of options that were available. Often, such treatments happened in a residential setting so as to provided needed talk therapy and other treatment. 

“You mean they wanted to stick you somewhere to rusticate and electrocute you!” Fred was horrified, “Like the Cruciatus Curse!” 

Hermione did not know what that was, but ECT wasn’t a curse. It didn’t hurt. No one really broke bones anymore, not with the muscle relaxants. The only objection Hermione had leveled against it was that she did not need it. Who wouldn’t go through periods of depression when coping with what she had? 

George did not give her time to get a word in edgewise before he was looking at her parents and declaring, “Muggles say we’re backwards, but we don’t go around sticking perfectly well people in institutions because we’re unwilling to listen and trust—”

“It is not a curse.” Mr. Weasley insisted, quelling his sons with a glance. They were two very angry and afraid young men. 

The teapot exploded, shards and liquid flying everywhere. Hermione could not figure out which one of them had done it, but she put money on Fred, because he was red in the face, and asking, “How could you possibly think—”

“That is enough!” McGonagall snapped, “I am going to ask Hermione to prove it beyond doubt, she will prove it, and we will all have a chat about the next steps that need to be taken for her growth and her benefit.”

Hermione watched as Molly flicked her wand, and the teapot was repaired. It was, according to the steam emitted from the spout, refilled. The mess on the table vanished with yet another small and discreet swoop. Hermione noted that her parents were gobsmacked, staring. 

McGonagall looked at the twins, “You do her parents a disservice if you think they were acting out of anything other than the genuine belief that they were helping her. Be silent or I will silence you.” 

Fred was not daunted, though Hermione thought that the arch of the professor’s eyebrow would have silenced anyone, no magic required. “This is Hermione!”

George agreed, saying. “Not some lecture we’ve disrupted with fireworks.”

McGonagall agreed, “And I did not want you two here, largely because this is Hermione’s business and you are entirely too—”

Hermione stuck out her hand under the table, and grabbed Fred’s wand. He relinquished it without comment. Hermione lifted her hand, and placed the wand on the table. The thunk of wood on wood silenced the professor. 

 “How would you like me to prove it?” She looked to her Mum and Dad, “I can light it up? I know the—” Hermione wasn’t quite sure of the distinction between spells, incantations, or other such things. 

Mrs. Weasley inserted, “Spell, dear.”

“I know the spell for that.” Hermione thereby demonstrated, watching as light gathered on the tip of Fred’s wand. 

Her mother was shocked out of her silence with a small cry. “But, where did you get the magical wand?”

“It’s not the wand that’s magical, Dr. Granger.” Professor McGonagall gently informed her, setting her teacup down as though they were discussing something as banal as baking bread, “Hermione is merely using the wand as a conduit to channel the magic that exists within her.”

“I’ve only borrowed it from Fred.” Hermione added, “I think that’s why I’ve been making things explode and randomly happen. My magic feels very uncontrolled.”

Her father’s face was a picture of clarity as he said, “The drop spindle.”

“What?” Hermione asked, shooting a quick glance over to the implement. It wasn’t moving. In fact, it was sitting there with her bags of carded wool and skeins of yarn. 

“Bunny…” Her mother gathered her thoughts for a long second, “When you spin or sew, you zone out, and things happen. You’re disassociated as you work on your project, or so we’ve always believed, because you’re seemingly effortlessly making an inhuman amount of progress.”

This wasn’t entirely news to Hermione. She was simply surprised that it had occurred to her parents, and that they were bringing it up. It did, however, explain the notation of possible Dissociative Identity Disorder in her medical charts. It also explained why her parents were so careful about checking with her if she understood her timetable and wanted to know what she had been doing. 

“It seems to me that her handicrafts are a focusing tool.” Mrs. Weasley ventured, “My knitting is the same way when I do it by hand. You infuse the fibers and the needles with magic, that’s all.”

“It’s nothing to fear, truly.” Mr. Weasley asserted, “This actually brings us to another topic.” He looked toward the woman wearing a summer dress made of fine seersucker, “Professor?”

“Wizarding people are a very old community. As such, we have many traditions and myths. There is one piece of lore that is germane to this discussion. I must ask you to disregard any present understanding of the term, and ask you if you feel what I am about to say applies to Hermione.” Professor McGonagall was very solemn, and Hermione knew what she was about to say was serious indeed. 

“Lightworkers are highly evolved witches and wizards.” McGonagall further defined the term, “They reincarnate in order to bring about massive and sweeping changes in our community, often pushing us toward greater good and ridding us of evil. In doing so, they balance magic, purify it, and send it back to Source. In the process of their own growth, they bring us closer to our own enlightenment.” 

“These souls are essentially thousands of years old, and their bodies serve as conduits for ancient magics largely lost to us today. They have a very clear awareness of their own soul, of their own path throughout history. They often remember past incarnations, retain personality traits, skills, and preferences that they developed over time, leaving them to have strong personalities as young children. They are fundamentally powerful, and—”

“We know you’re talking about Hermione.” Dad interrupted, “Just how many of these beings are there?” 

“We are aware of three souls who incarnate as a unit.” McGonagall informed him, “And I am confident that they sit before you.”

Hermione blinked, and then focused on the soul deep connection to the twins that she trusted and knew beyond doubt. She knew it to be true, deep within some part of her. She would not believe it until she had explored the idea, but at least there was a name for what she was, and at least there were other people like her. Blessedly, George and Fred were with her in this, and she knew that whatever they had come to do, that they would achieve. 

“You’re joking!” Mum blurted, “You’ve got to be joking. You mean to say that not only is my daughter magical, but basically she’s some kind of incarnated deity?”

“She’s as human as you or I.” Mrs. Weasley put in, swallowing some tea. “She’s not God. Primitive societies did elevate them as demigods, but…”

A laugh bubbled up in Hermione’s throat. That was beyond amusing. 

“Mollywobbles, now isn’t the time for that, maybe.” Mr. Weasley broke in, “What we do know is that they have been other people, yes, but it does not change that she is very much your daughter. She simply remembers that she used to be someone else in service of a higher calling.” 

Silence spread out between them. Hermione looked at her parents, and watched as a new hope bloomed in their eyes. She was struck at the leap of faith they were taking, and knew that they did not do this lightly. They were people of science. To even consider this must have been so outlandish, but she knew that there was nothing they would not do for her highest good. 

“We have a lot of questions, but I think that perhaps we need a bit of family time.” Mum asserted her hands shaking. Hermione knew that she was fighting tears as she considered her daughter, “Please do not feel that I am asking you to leave, but there is a lot to process.”

“Of course.” McGonagall patted Mum’s hand. “You are to be commended for taking this so well. I’ll check in tomorrow morning to see if I might be of any assistance.”

“And we live just across the field.” Mr. Weasley added, “We’ll adjust the wards so that you are all able see The Burrow, and you’re welcome anytime, truly.”

They all got to their feet, save for Fred and George. Mrs. Weasley prompted her sons, “Boys, it’s time to go. You can see Hermione tomorrow.” 

“How do we know that we can trust them?” Fred asked, not moving to even let go of her hand. “What if they’re both sitting there thinking, ‘Dear, smile for the barmy people, and then start the car?’”

“We aren’t.” Her Dad hastened, looking at the three of them very carefully. He ran a hand through his hair, “I don’t know what I’m thinking, but it’s not that.” 

Hermione knew he was telling the truth. Hermione was a little sad that they’d required a demonstration of magic to believe her, but to be fair, she had rather needed the same. It was human nature to want proof and validation. Hermione, in the last two days, had learned that lesson well. It was a step towards self-validation that could not be skipped. 

“Do you want us to stay, Hermione?” George asked, “We’re not leaving unless you feel alright right now.”

“I’m fine.” Hermione assured him, wondering if George was picking up on her lingering fear and disease, “Truly. We’ll talk. But I know they feel the truth in their hearts. 

A bit of a past life came flooding back, and she couldn’t resist proving this to her parents, petty though it must have been. She looked between the twins, “And anyway, we’re not in a cloister anymore.” She primly informed them, “All you have to do is knock on the door.”

Fred drawled, “Funny.”

George snorted, “I thought it was at the time.”

Hermione, through her mind’s eye, saw the person Fred’s soul had inhabited standing on the back of his horse as he cursed at George’s avatar, demanding to know why he had to be the one to sneak over the wall and open the door for George. His kilt had fluttered in the night breeze, and George had made some comment. 

Fred addressed her parents, who were clearly shocked that they were sitting there and teasing one another over something that had happened hundreds of years ago in some part of Scotland, some part of the world Hermione had never seen. “Scaling a nunnery was not one of my finer moments.” 

Hermione could not resist joining in on the fun. She wanted desperately for her parents to see that this was not a bad thing, that this was the start of so much happiness. She wouldn’t let it be anything else. “Shut up, I would’ve been a fantastic nun.”

“They had a vow of silence!” Fred cried, “A vow of perpetual silence!” 

“Think of all the things I could have done with my life.” Hermione shrugged, “Unencumbered by the cares of the world.” 

She didn’t exactly believe that any person she had been would have been suited to life religious, especially that of a cloistered nun, but it was indeed enjoyable to show her parents that this didn’t have to be scary. She glanced at them hopefully. 

“You didn’t even unpack your trunk.” George shut her down. 

Hermione saw a smile bloom in her father’s eyes. She’d done just the same at sleep away camp. She was never one for going away like that, and it seemed to her that was a part of her soul rather than her personality.

“I don’t remember that. In fact, I remember being quite contented. The music. The lack of pressure to be fashionable.” Hermione was just teasing, “Everyone knows how I hate sewing.” 

Mum laughed, and Hermione knew their mission was accomplished. 

“Alright, you lot have had your fun.” Mrs. Weasley laughed, “Say goodbye sometime in this century please.” 

And so they did, with a cheery farewell to McGonagall in the language of her foremothers. McGonagall laughed, and they left, walking across the field. 

Her parents gasped when they saw the cheery lights of the Burrow in the distance. In that moment, Hermione was content. She knew they had questions. She didn’t have all of the answers, but at least she knew they were on the same page. 

It was enough for now. Hermione turned back to her parents, and asked, “So, how do you feel about cheese toasties for lunch? Fred and George ate all of the biscuits.” 

Her father agreed, happily. Hermione knew they were relieved. 

They turned into the house. As they made the lunch, Hermione saw her parents exchange a telling glance. Hermione knew what they were thinking. None of this changed who she was in the now. To prove it, Hermione ate the crusts before she peeled the grilled part of the bread off of the soft breaded cheese, eating the soft cheese last. 

That settled their unspoken question. No matter who she had been, or would be in the future, she was always going to be their daughter. She was always going to carry that in her heart, even if she was strange enough to deconstruct a cheese toastie before eating it. If they could accept the fact that she was magical, they could learn to accept the proper way of eating sandwiches.   

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Translation of old Cornish](https://books.google.com/books?id=aX_SAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA152&lpg=PA152&dq=Meea+navidna+caw+zasawzneck&source=bl&ots=jho9XrZJ2i&sig=YEwUy01c3JJQoeMx60zGCS4j4rI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwivq8aAk8PQAhXJxYMKHdOJB4sQ6AEIJDAC#v=onepage&q=Meea%20navidna%20caw%20zasawzneck&f=false)
> 
>  
> 
> The political events Hermione references are the Easter Rising and the tensions of the 1910s, between the women's rights movement, Irish independence, and WWI. There was a lot going on and the period was very complex, but as Hermione notes, most of the twins' countryman would have supported the war efforts. Hermione was a suffragette. 
> 
> You're free to imagine star crossed lovers if you wish. 
> 
> The nunnery story was just this: Hermione was sent by her parents to a cloister, and her gallant highland men freed her. Sounds like a bodice ripper doesn't it? But really, it wasn't. They were friends in that life.

**Author's Note:**

> Reviews are life. Please? 
> 
> Chapter title: “As a man, casting off worn out garments taketh new ones, so the dweller in the body, entereth into ones that are new.”   
> ― Epictetus

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Through Incalculable Myriads](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8668705) by [PurpleHydrangeas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PurpleHydrangeas/pseuds/PurpleHydrangeas)




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